Speeches

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, the report on the protection of the European Union's financial interests, as you know, is voted on every year. I want to thank CONT from the outset, which in a large majority voted our position, and also thank the shadow rapporteurs. That doesn't mean we haven't found things to write in this report. Here is the increase in fraudulent and non-fraudulent irregularities in the revenue and expenditure sections in 2022, and certainly also an increase in the detection rate. Unfortunately, the European Commission did not intervene in the revision of the EUR 10 million threshold for transnational VAT fraud, as it should have been, to reduce it, in order to allow the European Public Prosecutor's Office to investigate. It means that there must be changes in the next period. I would also like to thank the Court of Auditors, OLAF, Eurojust, Europol, who have worked together to detect and prevent fraud risks. At the same time, I would like to stress, and I stressed in this report, as rapporteur, that we must monitor the proper spending of money in the European Union, which belongs to citizens, not only in the Member States, but also in the European institutions. As regards the anti-fraud architecture in the EU, in the report I recommend good cooperation and coordination between all its compartments and, of course, a holistic and result-oriented approach to the fight against fraud, more exigency, more transparency, because we have faced a lack of transparency from all the institutions. Thank you and I hope you will vote, as CONT has voted on this report, very important for the protection of financial interests.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, of course we must have a common policy, as we do for industrial policy, for agrarian policy, but I hope it is not as bad as agricultural policy, because protecting the oceans should not lead to a ban on fishing. There are areas where people live only by fishing and then we, the consumers, must benefit from the products of the internal market of the European Union and not import from third countries less controlled products. That is why I believe that the common fisheries policy and future prospects must take into account, first of all, the protection of fishermen and what they know how to do, and only through dialogue with them can we take action at European level. Too often it is decided at European level, without discussing with those who know well what needs to be done. Yes, I agree that we need to reduce plastic pollution, but this is not a matter for fishermen, and we need to protect fishermen.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, if we look at the title of the debate, we see, in fact, that it is a great hypocrisy. The Council is not present, but why did we choose this topic? Because Europe is boiling, because farmers are on the street. The Commissioner has not presented us with any solution, although the title is the Commission's statement on improving the economic and social situation of farmers. Commissioner, did a party colleague praise you, please say, in your answers, what are the concrete measures to improve the situation of farmers? We're all going home, I'm going to my country. What do I say to farmers who have been on the street for a week, in cold and hunger? What do we tell them? You said that you can no longer make a reservation that the crisis reserve is over, that you can no longer make derogations. So you've only said what you can't. I want to go home with a clear answer from the Commission, because we have, and I have asked you once again, Commissioner, to amend the common agricultural policy. It is not a common agricultural policy, as long as the subsidies are different. Please give us concrete answers so that we can tell the people at home what the Commission is going to do in the field of agriculture.

Mr President, Commissioner, Minister, if the citizens had listened to this debate, which is also called a priority, they would not only be disappointed, they would also be outraged. Nothing was said. What will the Council actually do on 1 February? What is the balance sheet? To the disgrace of Mrs. President, she left and around the end of her mandate, she did not stay for the joint debate, the priority debate. What do citizens understand? That we are interested in federalization, in putting into practice Mr. Macron's plan, the two-speed Europe? In fact, let's legalize it, that we have a two-speed Europe, because the Belgian presidency has said nothing about what will happen to Schengen. Is Romania's entry into Schengen and Bulgaria completed or not? Because the Commission's track record is disastrous: the market is divided, the population is impoverished, the population is polarised, farmers are on the street, transporters are on the street. Nothing was said: help farmers, change the common agricultural policy, help research, help the poor? Nothing. So this debate is a disaster, and this is my message, which I will convey to all citizens: We don't care about people's lives.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, the fact that we are now discussing the help that we continue to give to Ukraine, with the war going on for so long, means that American diplomacy and European diplomacy have been a failure, because people are dying every day, both in Ukraine and in Russia. The most important thing is people's lives. Of course we have to help Ukraine, but we have to see how we help it. Is there a plan? Do we know what's going on? Until we supply weapons? Until we give money? What is the finality? You don't know... The citizens are asking us. Then there is another problem, Mr Vice-President of the Commission, we know well that we still have problems with Ukraine with respect for certain things. The rights of citizens and minorities in Ukraine are not respected. Romanians do not have the right to speak Romanian. It's a failure the way we wanted to help Ukraine with crossing the internal market of the European Union with grain to other third areas, it's a failure and the farmers are on the street. We need to look at these things as a package. We cannot answer our citizens what we do with fairness in the internal market.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, respect for European Union law I believe that we must no longer invent it, it is clearly laid down in the Treaty. The important thing is to look at the application and it is surprising, Commissioner, to say that when there are individual petitions, we do not take them into account, because I believe that no one should – this is how we have the slogan – no one should be left behind. Every citizen is important and I will give you one example: if there are individual petitions, for example from several Member States, but on the same subject, such as the abduction, that I cannot name it otherwise, of children from school on certain grounds not yet verified and for years families are judging to recover their children, could not then the European Commission, the guardian of the Treaties, the superior right of the child, intervene? I believe that trust in the European institutions is lost when these petitions and, to top it all, European citizens' initiatives are the same way of acting on the part of the Commission, and then citizens will no longer trust either Parliament's Committee on Petitions or the European Commission. That is why I believe that every case is important and you must treat it as such.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, it is good that we are analysing, because if we are honest, we can now make it clear that the Solidarity Lanes did not work properly, and so is the title of the debate, we need to make sure that it does. Commissioner, I would invite colleagues who say it worked to come to Romania to talk to farmers. I met with thousands of farmers in Romania, in my country. Everyone complained about exactly what was happening. These grains and products from Ukraine, in fact, did not cross the solidarity lanes, but remained on the market, as you said, Commissioner. They remained and made an incorrect competition, because, let's not forget, it was also adopted that the grain from Ukraine should be exempted from phytosanitary analyses. Therefore, I invite you, Commissioner, to make a fair analysis, because we are destroying Romanian farmers. Solidarity does not mean spoiling what we have in the internal market. I very much believe that farmers have lost to them because of poor organisation, and it is our duty, the Commission, the Council, Parliament, to help farmers in the countries of the European Union.

Madam President, Prime Minister, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to congratulate the Spanish Presidency. We negotiated a trilogue on a very important directive, the gas and hydrogen market, and I congratulate you on all the work that, Prime Minister, you had as Spanish Presidency. I've been back from your country for two days, I've been to Madrid, I've visited a city hall in the Madrid area. Thank you for accepting over 1 million Romanians who work there. They have all said that they are respected in Spain and for this I want to thank you on their behalf and I want, Prime Minister, to tell you that nothing is more important than social cohesion and, of course, freedom of movement. That is why, please, you insist on ending the Presidency with the entry of Romania and Bulgaria into the Schengen area. Romanians there want to come home and be treated the same as other European citizens. We want to go to Spain and be treated the same. Therefore, I would like to ask you once again, at the end, to insist on Romania's entry into the Schengen area and to wish you all the best.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, we are discussing a very important package on protecting democracy. Nothing is more important. On 10 December we celebrated human rights and without democracy we cannot protect human rights. But do we have something to protect? We must not first correct the things that do not work now, because we have, as has been said here, cyber attacks, citizen insecurity, street attacks on the citizen. Basically, I think, Commissioners, that we must first correct the democratic system and then protect it, because I now see citizens in the European Union, not only in my country, and I receive letters from all the Member States how justice still does not work, how children are taken away and institutionalised, and years later it is considered that there were no arguments. So the suggestion is yes, to have a package to protect democracy, but first to define it very well and to be able for everyone to follow the same rules.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, we must say that teleworking arose in a context of crisis, but not all activities could be done from home and not all activities can be done from home even now. That is why I believe that the first thing we need to take into account is to have the same working conditions for those who work physically, and for those who still can or want to work, but it is essential to understand the social partners with employers. If they didn't agree, of course the government in that country still exists in subsidiarity and, ultimately, of course, the European Commission to come as an arbiter if these things are not respected, because, after all, it is also important for the employer to have healthy people, not to replace those who get sick. The life of the citizen and the right to privacy must be ensured. The last thing I want to say is that, unfortunately, there are still, you know, workers (maybe you have also discussed it) who want to work from home, but if they want to work from home, then they must have these rights assured.

Dear colleague, in fact, you did not answer my question. Of course I'm not skeptical. Of course, the specific question I asked you didn't answer me. You told me I didn't read the report. I read the report very well. I ask you once again, how can we ensure through this document that no data is transmitted if the patient does not request it?

Madam President, dear colleague, I agree with what you said. You gave an example, and I want to relate to the example you gave. If a patient goes and, of course, if what we want now (data transmission) would work, shouldn't data transmission always be done only at the patient's request? How do we ensure that no personal data is transmitted about us, about the diseases we have and, for example, at the request of an employer or an institution? How can we ensure that this data transfer is only requested at the request of the patient?

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I do not think that anyone can dispute the need to have critical raw materials in the European Union, to produce, to no longer depend on third countries, to have raw materials for important sectors: agriculture, health, construction and even defence. Commissioner, in addition to increasing demand for raw materials, there is a problem with specialists. We have a shortage of specialists, by 2030, in the field of electromobility alone of 1,200,000. We need to invest here, make the specialty of critical raw materials attractive. Urgent action is still needed to create this value chain here in the European Union. This regulation will certainly also help the reindustrialisation strategy that we launched a long time ago. We need to improve recycling and yes, we need to stop being directly or indirectly dependent on third countries. We must not criticise the third countries that produce - let us do it too, and it is good that it has been proposed to set up this European Critical Materials Committee, but it is not enough. It is important that it works and I would have liked the European Parliament not to be an observer but to be a member of this committee. I appreciate that it is a subgroup that focuses on the involvement of SMEs, but, Commissioner, it is not the case with the procurement directive that SMEs are only theoretically involved. This is where we need to act to support SMEs.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I have chosen to speak today about the functioning of the internal market. Why? We celebrated 30 years. We still have four months, this Parliament and the Commission, and I think we need to think about what we are leaving, what we are handing over to the next Parliament. Does the internal market work or not? The answer, even today, in the debate on tax policy, shows that we have a lot of areas with regional disparities, with people with very different incomes, distances between the high incomes of a few European citizens and a lot of poor people. And we have another problem: we do not have a single market; In the internal market we still have two spaces. I hope that by the end of the mandate, however, there will be only one market, the "single market", as we call it, because that is why the European Union was founded. This is where it started, from a single market and I hope that yes, my country, Romania, as well as Bulgaria, will also be in the Schengen area.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, we are discussing a very important subject: successive crises. Where has the impact, until the end, on the citizen, certainly, of small and medium-sized enterprises, micro-enterprises? We know that every state has the right to determine its fiscal mix, to adapt it to local, national needs, but we also need to have a harmonisation. There is now a huge gap. We say we want social cohesion; we have salaries within the internal market, in the 27 states, with differences from 1 to 1000. There are people who can't pay their current bill, they can't get food, they get sick, they can't get medicine. We must intervene and here I welcome the citizens' initiative, that of going to tax great wealth and, to be clear, you cannot have the same tax when you buy a plane or a private boat with a tax on a micro-enterprise with three people who are trying to earn an income to live with their family. It is therefore clear that, in addition to the fact that Member States have this right, the Commission must make a guide to good practice. The best measures have not been taken to protect the vulnerable consumer – I am also Vice-Chair of the Consumer Protection Committee – neither in terms of paying bills, nor in terms of the impact of the COVID pandemic and all inflation, the inflation shock has gone to the citizen. That is why I think it is also the role of the Commission to propose a guide to good tools for money support for vulnerable households, to have that wealth tax. Money cannot go to a small number of people and most European citizens are poor.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I would first like to thank the Spanish Presidency, with whom I work very well as rapporteur, and I believe that we must respect that. Secondly, Commissioner, I want to tell you that we have warned since we introduced this mechanism for the functioning of the rule of law that it can be used with a double measure. I would like to remind you that the legislative initiative on which we are currently debating is an internal matter. Any government can have legislative initiative, whether it passes or not is not the problem of the European Commission. When I wrote you a letter, Commissioner, in which I asked for uniform judicial accountability in all Member States, you replied that the organisation of justice and the functioning of justice is subsidiarity. This is the answer you signed. Then why do you want this? If the EPP has bothered you so much, why did you not complain that the rule of law does not work before the elections and not after the results?

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I have always advocated that the ambitious objectives be brought into line, of course, with the reality and the situation on the ground. It is good that we all want to fight to reduce packaging waste, but let's not forget that packaging or the amount of packaging is directly proportional to the amount of fruit, food that the population consumes. Yes, it is overconsumption and we know it. Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, we could make good rules if we also took into account the recommendations of those who are good at it. There are amendments here, I have also recorded and I hope.... For example, let me give you one example: amendment 417, which provides for a derogation for the best-performing packaging formats, because not every packaging fits every product. Here we must take this into account, and I believe that tomorrow we must vote very intelligently and objectively on amendments to correct the Commission's proposal, which, in my view, was not everywhere objective and did not take account of reality.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, if farmers listen to us now - this debate - they will say this: Everyone knows everything. I am very curious if those who are extremely supportive of banning pesticides have been to see a cornfield felled to the ground by pests. I believe that we must protect the environment, but I also believe that we cannot do twofold, Commissioner, because you have approved, for example, imports from Ukraine without phytosanitary analyses and destroyed producers in my country, in Romania, and in other states, and at the same time, the pressure is on farmers and producers in the European Union. At the same time, it is absolutely discriminatory, as in my country, if we reduce by 50% to reach 300 grams per hectare, and in the Netherlands to 4,000. So if we do not try to have rational measures and find substitutes first and then ban, we will destroy European agriculture and live off imports that are full of pesticides, as many colleagues have said. I believe that we must first build a bridge and then tear down the one that exists, and I believe that citizens have the right to do so. Let it be known very clearly that this extremism of green protection is harmful to the citizen and not beneficial.

Madam President, Commissioner, honourable colleagues, sure, citizens often ask us what we do for them, specifically, what we do for them? Here is a new example: in addition to roaming, in addition to the common charger, we are now once again giving consumers and citizens in our countries something concrete: Right to repair. Let's not imagine that until now it has not been repaired, but everyone had to deal with it, sometimes paying a lot, giving up the repair... Now there are some things that are clear enough here, but it is important how the Member States will also get involved, because they have to take into account what we are regulating here: have - each Member State, at least one platform where the consumer can meet the repairers, know where to go to repair. And it is very important what you said, Commissioner: the product must be repairable, because if it makes it disposable, it is in vain that the consumer can no longer make it. That is why I will be very supportive and I hope that this report will pass tomorrow, because it brings something very good, on the one hand for consumers, on the other hand the decrease in waste, because we all know how much waste from all products has increased.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, of course, the Commission has set itself a reindustrialisation strategy. Ultimately, the European Union must increasingly decrease its dependence on imports from third countries. We know what happened to us in the pandemic. Value chains are not being restored and it is clear that the transition must not shatter SMEs. That is why I believe that we must rely on innovation, research, technology, safe, low-emissions, but we cannot remain dependent on third countries. That is why I think it is good - and it is good that this was mentioned in the report - to strike this balance in reindustrialisation, in modern technologies that are low-emission, but to complete our value chains and become competitive, because dependence on third countries makes us uncompetitive and takes us out of the global market.

Doamnă președintă, doamnă comisară, stimați colegi, au trecut 34 de ani de când s-a declarat Ziua Internațională a Drepturilor Copilului. And where are we? We have 5 million children in poverty, and I am not talking about the crisis, the pandemic, the war, I am talking about the fact that in these 34 years, in fact, the crisis related to the rights of the child has deepened. I'm not just referring to the fact that there are children who may eat less or sleep in less heat. I am also referring to the fact that they are plucked very often, the children, from the family and nothing is more valuable than the love of the mother and the parents. I believe that this is where we must follow, the European Union, and, of course, the Member States. I dealt with cases of children taken, who were recovered by families after 3, 4, 5 years, children who remained with trauma. Why were those children taken? For imaginary reasons? Sometimes it is because the family is poor. But let's intervene here, to provide families, parents, jobs, to have incomes, so that children grow up in the family and not in those centers and in those state institutions.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, nothing can be more important for the functioning of the internal market than resources, own resources. And it is good that we have this report and we are doing an analysis, but I want to say very clearly: We must stop lending money on the back of the citizen. Commissioner, we have some agencies to deal with, from Europol, the European Court of Auditors, the European Public Prosecutor's Office, which was set up with the aim of reducing, if not putting an end to, tax evasion, tax havens. So a good policy for own resources is to collect, not add taxes. That is why I think it is a very important task, because an extended internal market with 35 states will not be able to function if we do not end the policies of ultimately circumventing the law and moving money to other areas, to areas of tax haven. I think we need a new policy, a new thinking, but above all a correct implementation of fiscal policies.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, of course, I am also reserved for the results of this Summit. And why am I reserved? I recently visited as Vice-Chair of the Committee on the Internal Market in the United States. There were other committees present, a lot of dialogue, but let's remember that in the last term we were not able to finalize in the Trump administration the TTIP and my hope, and probably that of many, was that in the Biden administration we would finalize this transatlantic agreement. Of course, it's good that we have a trade and technical council. The problem is to look at the results. And yes, there will be elections in the United States, and I think we are entering a new leadership of the United States without any concrete results. It is very good that the lifting of visas was also mentioned, but you see, my country, for example, is not a beneficiary of the lifting of visas, and these are just statements that are not covered in the facts, and I think that this is what we need to emphasise, Commissioner and the Presidency of the Council, to have results. The United States is an important partner for the European Union's internal market.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, today is World Education Day, and let me extend my congratulations and ‘Happy Birthday’ to all those who work and strive for the education of children: teachers, teachers, educators and parents, and to give them the hope that today, on Education Day itself, we are talking here about something extremely important – how to have a strategy for a safe internet for children. The situation shows that violence has increased in schools. Suicides are internet calls for violence. Look at the cartoon movies, their content, the language of the characters in the cartoon movies. We'll never be able to get teachers or parents to watch them minute by minute. It's important and I think the key to success is content. It must not appear online what is not allowed in the educational act, offline. There should be no violent content, no urges to use drugs. Violence has increased between students, but also between students and teachers. That is why, Commissioner, I think we need to think seriously about how we can regulate content.

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, the revision of the Directive after 30 years is a necessity. The treatment of urban wastewater is a matter of human health and that is why I think the revision is very welcome and I think that the focus should be on the polluter pays principle. It must not be enough for the citizen to pay to have access to clean water, because it is a citizen's right to have access to clean water, and the energy neutrality that we proposed in 2040 is also related to this. The responsibility of the Member States to adapt the directive into national law is major, because here we clearly have the responsibility of Big Pharma, the responsibility ultimately of all industrial sectors and even of citizens to manage waste and not to pollute waters. It is our duty to adopt this directive and, of course, congratulations to those who have worked and I hope that it will be implemented as soon as possible in the national legislations.